Catfight rises over bill to bar pet tigers

For Suzette Stidom, having a pet tiger in her back yard is one of the rights that make her proud to live in the United States.

Top Cat, who prowls around his enclosure behind Stidom's home in Houston, is one of an estimated 5,000 pet tigers in the country--a figure considered nearly equal to the world's wild tiger population.

"I got him because I wanted to be different from everyone else," said Stidom, who has owned two big cats--the other being a lion--for eight years. "If you can afford to feed them, and keep them safely as they get old, you should be allowed to have one. This is America."

But a coalition of animal-welfare groups, headed by the American Zoo and Aquarium Association and the Humane Society of the United States, contends the booming trade in pet tigers poses a danger, particularly to children and the tigers, which can weigh was much as 600 pounds and eat 20 pounds of meat a day.

The International Species Information System, which tracks the number of animals in licensed zoos and sanctuaries, says there are 1,151 tigers in the world's zoos, about half of them in the United States. No one knows precisely the number of wild tigers, a highly endangered species, but conservation experts put the number at 5,000.

Not only is it legal to keep a pet tiger in most states, it also is largely unregulated. Also, the federal endangered species law does not cover pet tigers because those in private hands usually come from "mongrel" strains.

The two groups claim the lack of oversight is responsible, in part, for reports of pet tigers maiming or killing humans every year.

From an animal-welfare point of view, the tigers, which in captivity are just as fertile as domestic cats, are filling up animal sanctuaries. They arrive at the refuges for a number of reasons, from stalking an owner's children to being used as guard animals by drug dealers.

So the coalition is backing the Captive Wildlife Safety Act, a bill introduced by Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.) that seeks to bar the interstate movement of bears and big cats. It would be the first federal regulation of tigers as pets.

An exception in the proposed legislation would be made for animals whose owners have a permit from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which regulates licensed outfits such as circuses, zoos, sanctuaries or research facilities, Miller said.

Noting that the USDA and the American Veterinary Medical Association strongly oppose big cats being kept by untrained private owners, Miller said the legislation could be enacted before the end of the current congressional session.

"This is a stunning cultural phenomenon, but it's the first time a serious effort has been made to try and stop it, " said Wayne Pacelle, senior vice president of the Humane Society.

"There is no justifiable reason for a person to have a tiger or a lion as a pet," he said. "These are potentially dangerous animals, and they belong in the wild."

Opponents of regulation say it tars responsible owners with those who abuse their animals, said Patti Strand, president of the National Animal Interest Alliance.

The Houston Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals opened a special wing at its shelter to house big cats in response to the increasing numbers turning up. The group rescues about one pet tiger every three months and twice that number of other big cats.

Texas does not ban pet tigers but requires them to be registered. The state has experienced three attacks on young children by such animals over the past three years.

At least seven people have been killed by tigers in the United States in the past four years, said Philip Nyhus, an assistant professor of environmental studies at Franklin and Marshall College in Lancaster, Pa. That is less than the number killed by dogs, which take the lives of about 15 people a year.

But given their relative numbers, it makes tigers one of the country's most lethal pets.